I lke putting first-timers up. Especially great guys like John Pol all the way from Alberta, Canada who told me he had never fished in the ocean and his first fish turns out to be a yellowfin tuna that he battled for 2 hours! Nice start! Next day he rolls a 50-pound roosterfish and his last day, a fat pompano (picture down below).

Darrin Williams is another first timer who came to visit this week and had one day full of bonito bendo then his 2nd day ran into some nice dorado north of La Paz. He’s from the Bay Area and runs a very popular basketball academy in the Bay Area. Check him out on Google. Great to have him visit!

You probably wont’ see many great photos like this one. Great colors and this is what a tuna should look like! Roger Thompson our amigo living in La Ventana was working Cerralvo Island with Captain Hugo and rocked this bad boy on some chunked squid.

Eli Rush poses with about a 45-pound amberjack he took off Espirito Santo Island. Eli is from San Diego. It was a good day of action as they also got into alot of big bonito.

Todd Ross from Granite Bay CA and Ken McConnell from Chico CA are two more first timers who got into the bonito as well as this speedy wahoo while fishing with our Tailhunter Las Arenas fleet.

Amigo Gavin Chun has fished with us several times and shows off some nicer dorado from La Paz as well as one of several nice cabrilla he caught. Gavin is from San Francisco.

Big bonito like this are really tough to pull in, let alone hold up for a photo, but there’s lots of bonito providing action right now like this one in the hands of Julianne Argent from San Diego.

It’s our Canadian amigo, John Pols again, this time with a photo of his big pompano!

NICE WEEK ON THE WATER – FISHING WAKING UP!

Kids here all heading back to school and “spring break” for Mexican kids comes to a close. It’s been a crazy busy two or three weeks with lots of folks on the beaches and on the water as these holidays are actually the largest in Mexico. Even bigger than Christmas in terms of traveling and visiting. It’s also been just great beach weather with highs in the mid-80’s and evenings in the low 60’s.

For fishing, it’s been a decent week. Not great. But not bad either. Lots of action but that needs some explaining. Everyone is catching fish, but we’re still transitioning from winter/ cooler to spring/warmer conditions so the fishing is still mixed up. Those pesky winter winds seemed to have finally calmed down. The last two weeks it’s been great weather to be on the water, but as I write this, the coming week, the winds are coming back up! So, it could be a bumpy week.

TAILHUNTER LAS ARENAS FLEET

If you wanted action this was a great place to fish all week. There’s tonnage of mackerel and ballyhoo in the bay. Still not much sign of sardines which doesn’t bode well for our fly fishers who have been watching the reports, but most of them don’t show up for awhile when the winds start dying down. Still, the sardines are what we like to see.

However, the schools of mackerel have drawn in big spots of bonito that are just ripping everyone up. It’s great fun, especially for a lot of our first-timers; snow birds; or light tackle folks. A dozen or two bonito a day with every bait hitting the water getting slammed is awesome sport! Most of the fish are getting tossed back to chew again, but there’s also white bonito in the mix which are pretty good eating. So, if your captains suggest you keep a bonito, don’t scrunch up your face! Keep it! Don’t tell folks it’s bonito and they will think it’s tuna! Honest. Seen it happen a lot, especially for the white bonito. Makes pretty good poke and sashimi too!

The other side of the great bonito explosion is that there’s also some nice 20-50 pound tuna in the area and near the south end of Cerralvo. The tuna are deeper and not as as as the scooting bonito! So, often as soon as a bait hits the water, the bonito blow up on it and the bait never has a chance to get down to the tuna or for the lumbering tuna (no slouch for speed) to get up and grab the bait.

However, yes, there’s some bigger model tuna around and we did get a couple. Squid is also working on them as well as the mackerel. Also, we have some wahoo swimming up in the same areas too!

There’s been some rooster fish action along the beaches, but it’s hard to gauge because everyone is out chasing the fast action on the bonito or looking for the tuna, wahoo or other species they can eat.

TAILHUNTER LA PAZ FLEET

For our anglers that fished with our La Paz fleet north out’ve La Paz and around Espirito Santo Island, the effects of the transition from cooler to warmer water is definitely evident.

The cooler water around the island is still holding nice yellowtail, some pargo and cabrilla. We hooked a number of yellowtail this week, but the problem is that these fish are tough and in the rocks and near reefs. So many fish were busted off. You really gotta lean into these fish or you’re gonna end up with some limp line and a frown. If you look at our numbers, it doesn’t look good, but it doesn’t tell the whole story because some big fish got lost.

Outside of the island, waters are warming and the sargasso weeds are starting to build up which are a great haven for the dorado. There’s not a lot yet, but the conditions look great. Blue water and sargasso are a great combo plus bait to eat! We just need the waters to warm a tad. We did get a few nicer mahi-mahi in the 20-pound class near San Juan de la Costa.

There’s some big roosters near the white sand beaches and along the rocks, cabrilla, pargo and triggers are around.

However, just like for our Las Arenas fleet, there’s big schools of bonito. Not only are the schools big, but the bonito are heffers too! Good rod-bending action, but getting through the bonito schools with your bait so you can get other species was an issue all week.

THE REDHEAD IS LOOSE!

First bottle out’ve the first case for a “test drive.”

Jason Hite zoomed down to the restaurant as soon as he heard we had the beer…and his band broke down on the way and he still was there to drink the first official bottle!

We wanted to welcome our new Tailhunter IPA to our Tailhunter Restaurant. It finally arrived and we have it for sale now at our place on the La Paz Malecon. It’s our first micro-brewed craft beer with more to follow and we’re excited and really proud to finally have it waiting for you all chilled up! It’s a micro-brew so it’s being hand-crafted and made only in small batches. It’s pretty tasty especially on a sunny La Paz afternoon!